Alphagym

I’ve been meaning to blog about alphagym for the longest time, but was waiting to take more decent pictures of the class before doing so.

Christian started gym class sometime in 2012, after we found that his school report said he needed a lot of encouragement at the high slides, and might need some help with his gross motor skills. So at the recommendation of one of his classmate’s mum, we started classes at the gym at Big Splash and began our weekend routine of gym/berries classes.

It took a long time to follow the teacher’s instructions during warm up, instead of simply standing and observing. My dad once stayed back 15 minutes after the start of class till he could bear to see no more – he came home to report that we were wasting our money cos our son refused to move, and perhaps we should send him to see a counsellor instead.

I consulted with his class teacher for her views, she said some children just need to feel safe and comfortable before they partake in activities they think might be embarrassing. And so we persevered and brought him week after week, trying to let him experience the intrinsic motivation of doing a task well, and the sense of accomplishment that accompanies the acquisition of new skills.

A year later, we are happy to say that his confidence in himself has increased leaps and bounds. He is now one of the first to show off in his class, to jump here and there, to play hopscotch, to swing from bars. The improvement is so stark that his school principal emailed me for the contact of the gym class so she could pass it on to other parents whose children she recommends go for such classes too. And thus, Christian began seeing some schoolmates at gym and was so pleased to be able to interact with them outside of class.

Sadly, we will be stopping gym classes this June.  He seems to have gotten what we set out to achieve in the beginning, and having started swim classes, there isn’t enough time during the weekends to dash here and there. We are going to focus on swim classes for now and maybe a bit later, Christian can decide if he wishes to take up gym classes to learn cartwheels and somersaults